


guns in my head

by Anonymous



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Earth-27 (Fandom Page), The Umbrella Academy (TV), Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Batfamily Dynamics (DCU), Dimension Travel, Family Bonding, Multi, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, Wordcount: 5.000-10.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:27:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25679632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: ”So, you guys aren’t part of the scary time travelling organization that wants to maybe kill us and end the world?”“God no! We're an unsanctioned paramilitary organization made up of pseudo-siblings who jump off of rooftops for fun.”That... felt a lot more familiar, other than the jumping off rooftops bit, if Diego was being honest, but that mostly said a lot about his childhood than anything else.
Relationships: Batfamily - Relationship, No Romantic Relationship(s), The Hargreeves Family
Comments: 22
Kudos: 401
Collections: Fanfic Anonymous





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There are trigger warnings in here for blood, gore, which is an emergency surgery performed at one point. By a sixteen-year-old on another sixteen-year-old, along with trigger warnings for past emotional and mental abuse.

Where are we?" Vanya murmured, leaning on Allison as much as her sister was leaning on her, a sort of dazed expression playing across her face. Diego might have said it was fair, considering the week they'd had, but he was more concerned with Five, since Five was fainting.

"Shit!"

Klaus barely managed to catch their brother, mostly just slowing his fall, which was better than nothing. Diego knelt beside them, checking Five's pulse and breathing. "Seems okay enough."

"Well, it's not the end of the world," Luther said, having chosen to focus on the first question asked, as opposed to fainting younger siblings - they'd always gone by numbers, in terms of who was oldest. "That's a win."

"It's also not the theatre," Vanya rubbed her neck, looking worse and worse every time Diego got a look at her. "Isn't time travel... same place... other time?"

"Five?" Klaus asked, shaking said Five. "Did you do something wrong? Are you dead?"

"He's not dead!" Diego snapped, smacking Klaus' hand away before he made it worse. "Remember how he disappeared the first time? And then teleporting five more people, why do you think he's knocked out?"

Diego wasn't sure if Klaus was still high on something - unlikely, considering the apparition of maybe-Ben - or if he'd finally snapped, but his brother made a drawn-out _oh_ sound and looked slightly sheepish. Diego was going to presume that he was clean for the moment. Or, at least, not high.

"Guys," Vanya cleared her throat, and pointed across the rooftop - why had Diego not noticed that detail? - towards a pair of shadows. Humanoid figures, dark.

"Uh..." was all Diego managed to say before he froze up, both figures moving forwards. Because they were utterly _terrifying_.

The taller one trailed behind the shorter one, who seemed more feminine, slowly circling the siblings, prowling like a giant cat stalking prey. The taller one stayed on one side of the group, which was not reassuring at all. Diego set a hand down on the gravel of the rooftop, gathering up a handful. If he went for where the eyes might be... He might be able to do some damage, buy time for Luthor to knock them across the city. Klaus was mostly useless - Diego silently apologized to his brother, even though none of them were telepathic - Allison's power was down the drain and both she and Vanya were partially out of it from the trip of a day they'd had. Five was out for the count. Ben was dead.

Turned out, Diego didn't need to worry. The shadows melted away like they were washing off, slinking back into the natural shade, and revealing a pair of teenagers where they'd been. Semi-normal looking teenagers. Maybe like they were doing some kind of cosplay - Diego had spent enough time around Klaus to know about that stuff, even if it was just basic.

The shorter figure that had circled them was a girl. Black hair cut just below her ears, held back by pins, out of her face. She had a shawl-like thing settled around her shoulders, which seemed to also be a cape of some kind, and a faint outline of yellow crossed her chest and shoulders, tracing a bat-like shape. Over one shoulder, the hilt of a sword was visible, a bit of fabric pulled over her mouth and nose like a veil, tucked over her ears.

The other one was a guy, in black and yellow, the colour muted, as some kind of camouflage. He didn't have a shawl-thing, but he was wearing a jacket with a hood, said hood covering his head, casting dark shadows over his eyes. Sticks, maybe nunchucks or something similar, were clipped to his hip.

"Found the disturbance," the boy said, sounding remarkably normal. Diego had almost expected him to sound like a demon or something. "Bringing them in."

Klaus put his hand up. Diego resisted he urge to punch him because he just knew that his brother was about to say something stupid. And he was right, as the next words out of Kalus' mouth were, ”So, you guys aren’t part of the scary time travelling organization that wants to maybe kill us and end the world?”

The taller one snorted. “God no! We're an unsanctioned paramilitary organization made up of pseudo-siblings who jump off of rooftops for fun.”

That... felt a lot more familiar, other than the jumping off rooftops bit, if Diego was being honest, but that mostly said a lot about Diego's childhood than anything else. And his life in general, he guessed.

"Huh," the same guy said, seemingly considering the Hargreeves a second time. "Normally, when people hear that, they get very worried. Mind telling us who you guys are?"

Diego frowns at that. Okay. They've kind of faded out of public eye since Ben's death, but Allison is a famous actor, and Vanya wrote that book, so both of them are fairly recognizable. Not insanely so, but most people know them from somewhere. He's more out of it, and Five is certain out of it, along with Klaus and Luthor. And, well, Ben's dead.

Still. Kind of worrying.

"The Umbrella Academy?" Vanya tries, which Diego is too tired from this week to deal with. He doesn't even care at this point, but the two show no signs of knowing what the Umbrella Academy is. "Heroes?"

"There's a lot of heroes around," the tall guy says, tapping at his ear, which seems really, really weird to Diego, but he's too tired to figure it out at the moment. "I'm Signal. This is Orphan. And I've never heard of you guys, but well, dimensional disturbance, so that's probably why."

Dimensional disturbance.

Fine. Diego isn't the smartest one - they all know Fives is the fucking genius of the family and Luthor is the idiot, no matter how much the guy denies it, and Klaus is whip-smart when he's not high and when he makes an effort - but Diego has picked up comic books. He knows what dimensional disturbances are. And he knows that whenever they pop up, the characters in the stories usually get their asses handed to them, one way or another.

So he feels justified in groaning. The guy laughs. "Yeah, that's fair."

* * *

Vanya's not quite sure what's happening. She's not sure she wants to know what's happening, but she's aware that the girl - who's very short, Asian, and moderately to severely terrifying - has an arm around her back, and is dragging her across the rooftop. Vanya doesn't want to go with the girl - Orphan seems to be a morbid name, Vanya's not very happy about that - so she twists around, looking for her siblings. Luthor has Five in his arms, a blank look on his face, and Diego is supporting Allison, and glaring at Klaus, who's poking at the guy in yellow.

Diego, however, notices her and gives her a slight nod and smile. Vanya figures that if he thinks it's okay, then it's probably okay. She's had a long week, between Dad's death, and the entire time travel and end of the world thing, not to mention Five and discovering superpowers and the cell and hurting Allison. It's been... exhausting. She's surprised she hadn't passed out while on her feet yet, but maybe that's just adrenaline.

"Oracle," the girl says, speaking to the air, as they head down the fire escape, which creaks and clatters and is altogether all too loud amid the nightlife of whatever city they're in, and Vanya doesn't give a shit what's happening right now. Diego thinks it's okay. It's okay. "Car?"

Nothing. Vanya still doesn't care, but a minute or so later, a car turns into the alleyway, stopping before them. It's black, sleek, low to the ground, and the door pops up like it's a DeLorean from Back to the Future. Vanya lets the girl - who, despite being, like five foot four, is amazingly strong - manhandle her into the car, which is kind of like a tiny armoury and medical room all in one. Vanya leans against a mostly-bare section of the wall, and pulls her knees and close to her chest as she can manage. A little bit later, Allison slides in beside her, glaring at Luthor, and Five is set down in the middle. Orphan is near the front, but she's not driving, and neither is the other guy, who's riding shotgun. The rest of Vanya's siblings squeeze into the back without complaining and Vanya latches onto Diego's wrist with one hand.

He says nothing, and neither does she. The door slides shut, and the car begins to move.

It's quiet. Smooth, the engine a soft rumble under Vanya's feet, and it's relaxing. Orphan doesn't speak in the least, but Signal, the other guy does, seemingly giving a report. "Seven of them. Youngest is maybe thirteen, the rest young adults, twenty-five at the most. One addict seems recently clean, violinist or some stringed instrument, the other girl has a fresh cut across the throat as Hood did to Red that one time, possible loss of voice,"

Vanya lets her head drop onto Diego's shoulder and numbly wonders how the guy picked all that up, studying the fingertips of one hand. Maybe there are signs? She doesn't know. But it's kind of creepy, in all honestly, and Vanya wants to go back to her apartment, go back to when she was unlucky number seven, with no powers, no talents, and no friends. It wasn't a happy life, but it was a normal enough one, and Vanya can handle being lonely. She's done it for years.

Diego nudges her, and the door opens again, letting them out. Vanya blinks rapidly at the change in lighting, from city streets at night, to bright fluorescent lighting, like they had at hospitals. It's either underground or sealed off, as there are no windows, and it's a large space, like some kind of bunker. A group of computer monitors and a medical section and training mats and old-fashioned weapons and weight-training machines and all sorts. Vanya reaches for Diego's hand, and their fingers lace together, her eyes finding the person at the computers.

They're ginger, hair pulled back into a neat ponytail, glasses perched on their nose. The angle they're at compared to Vanya and her family and the car lets her see a side profile, so Vanya can see the loose, light blue shirt she wears, half-falling off one shoulder, revealing a bra strap, and she can see that the chair she's in is actually a wheelchair and that she's got a pair of rings on her fingers, silver and glinting in the light. Not married. Maybe belonging to lost loved ones. She's got a headset on, with a mike held before her mouth.

"Nightwing, take the next left, speed up, you should cut them off. Yeah, yeah, be careful, we've got enough - uh-huh, sure."

She's smiling by the end of the sentence. "Great. Call me if you get in - you always do - Sign and Lil' O got back, I gotta deal with the travellers, don't die."

The last bit is said with an intensity that Vanya's never heard in person, but it just screams love and friendship and family and adoration and hope. It makes her chest hurt.

The woman reaches up, tapping something with her finger, and holding down. "This is O, signing off, I have to deal with the travellers. All tech to be rerouted to Lil' Red, all emergencies to Batwoman. Out."

She takes the headset off, and sets it on her lap, taking out her ponytail and combing her fingers through her hair, letting it fall around her shoulders. With a soft sigh, she wheels backwards and turns to face the group, leaning back in her chair, and wearing a knowing smile that makes Vanya feel like if this woman wanted to, she could destroy the world, and she's fully aware of that. Like this woman knows all of her secrets, or will, by the time their conversation is over.

“So,” the woman says, arms resting on her armrests. Orphan appears beside the woman, arms crossed loosely, one hip jutted out, and Vanya looks around for Signal, and finds him at the computer station, typing in a laptop one-handed. “You can call me Oracle. You met Signal and Orphan. First things first? If you’re here to hurt my family, they will never even remember you existed.”

Vanya doesn’t doubt it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sisters, breakfast, zombies, fainting.

Allison wakes up to loud screaming. It's not the kind of screaming that makes her go bolt-upright, jumping out of her bed and running to Claire's room, but it's the kind of screaming she associates with Klaus and Luthor's early morning arguments. The kind that isn't bad, but not super-good either.

_"Oh my god, for the love of - we don't have any coffee!"_

_"Why do you get waffles but I can't have -"_

_"She's not addicted to them."_

_"Yeah, what Carrie said."_

_"Oh, just take her side then!"_

_"Pretty much, yeah."_

Allison stands up, looking across the room to Vanya, who looks, if possible, more disoriented by the noise than Allison feels. Allison opens her mouth to speak, is hit by pain, and remembers that, yeah, right. She's not supposed to do that right now, injury and all that, so she closes her mouth and goes to find clothes.

Oracle, or Barbara, as she finally introduced herself as, was scary. As was... everyone else they'd met the night before, although they'd only met two of them in person. Cassandra and Duke. The rest had sometimes chipped in on coms, notably a 'Red Robin', who had a lot of technically babble that Allison didn't even try to figure out, and a 'Red Hood', who mostly swore and demand that Red Robin get his ass over to where he was for whatever reason.

Allison stood up and started towards the door. She was in the pyjamas that Duke had given her, which seemed like they were probably supposed to fit someone else, and were probably someone else's, considering she doubted they just had random clothes lying around that went unused. Vanya stood up as well, clinging to her sister's side. They hadn't been forced to divide by gender, but the girls had done it all the same. Allison had silently insisted because she wanted to show Luther that he wasn't the boss of her and to show the rest of them, and Vanya, that she still trusted their sister. 

Their fingers laced together, and Allison smiled at her sister, leading her into the hallway. Then, she headed towards the voices - Rumour gave her the ability to pinpoint the location of voices, which was a very nice touch that had been mostly useless up until today.

_"Dude, that is not at all healthy!"_

_"Our jobs aren't exactly healthy either, or did you forget?"_

_"Getting shot at and pouring energy drinks into high-energy coffee are two very different things."_

_"Jason! I was going to drink that!"_

_"You were going to give yourself a heart attack, is what you were going to do, dumbass."_

There were a handful of people in the kitchen space. Living room. Thing. It was a hybrid room. A black kid - Duke, Allison remembered - was at the table, alternating between typing on a laptop that she was fairly certain had bullet holes in the back of it - she'd seen it before, thanks so much, _Dad_ \- and eating Mini-Wheats. Beside him, the Asian girl, Cassandra, was dumping a frankly terrifying amount of salt and pepper on her scrambled eggs, and beside her, was a ginger girl.

She looked just a _bit_ like Barbara. She had glasses on, with rectangular lenses, the arms and frames made out of metal, and painted lime green, engraved with something that Allison couldn't make out. She had on a white hoodie with black-grey text on it that identified it as a product of Wayne Enterprises, which had to be some company in this universe - that was a terrifying thought - and her hair was cut like Diego's, but grown out a few inches longer, golden-red.

And she was eating porridge. With strawberries on top.

At the counter, where a toaster and coffee machine and sink and a few other things were, was a pair of boys. They looked similar enough that Allison could believe they were related by blood, with dark brown hair that was probably actually black, and they were both white. Allison couldn't make out the shorter one's eyes, because he needed a haircut, but the taller one had green-blue irises. They were built differently, probably due to an age difference, the taller one with clear muscle, while the shorter one was more like Diego when he was compared to Luther, wiry and thin.

The taller one was draining a silver travel mug down the drain, holding the shorter one away with an outstretched hand, his palm on the guy's forehead. The smaller boy had given up on fighting and was just standing there, glaring at the taller one.

"I need it," he insisted. The taller one shook his head.

"You need to sleep."

"You need to say _hello_ ," the girl sing-songed, drawing the pair's attention. She pointed to the Hargreeves siblings with her spoon, dripping a bit of porridge onto the table, which she swiped up with a finger, licking it off. Ew.

"Jason." the taller one grunted. "The idiots Tim."

"I'm Carrie," the girl said, giving the Hargreeves a wave with her spoon, and somehow not getting porridge in Cassandra's hair. "Barbara's cousin and adopted sister."

So they were related.

"Want breakfast?"

Yes. Yes, they did.

Carrie was very chatty, as it turned out. She also liked to do things. She bustled around the kitchen, ordering the two brothers to the table, snatching the now-empty travel mug from Jason and dropping it in what might have been an incinerator or garbage disposal, shut the door, and pulled down a lever. Tim looked longingly at the coffee machine, and Jason filled a mug with orange juice, forcing him to have that instead.

Carrie put eggs, sausages - she assured the sisters that it was not vegetarian because apparently, they were disgusting, and their vegetarian brother (her in-law, Allison tried not to read into that too much) hated them - and toast on the plates, checked them for allergies, added fruit, and asked them their preferred drinks. All while talking.

Carrie was a drama student. Carrie was the fourth Batgirl. Carrie was near-sighted, agnostic, and she hated the word shellfish for no particular reason other than she could. She likes bears but didn't like deer. She had time travelled once, and stayed in the past for a few hours, and had been very bored. She sometimes told people she was ADHD when they asked her if she could ever stop talking even though she wasn't. She'd never broken a bone in a way that required a cast - that was concerning, but everything that had happened this week had been concerning, so Allison didn't bother getting concerned over it.

Vanya started to pick at her toast, using a plastic spork that was a dull pink colour with flecks of grey that were supposed to be sparkles. Carrie had informed them that they weren't allowed to have breakable cutlery things, or proper cutlery things because they were all insane and stabbing attempts were normal. That was also concerning, but Allison had grown up with Diego, who'd thrown knives around and made them spin around her head endlessly, she could handle it.

Carrie didn't stop talking until Jason physically slapped a hand over her mouth and told her in no uncertain terms to shut up for five minutes or he would show no mercy in training. Carrie kept her mouth shut after that, but Allison knew she had an eye on the clock on the wall that went tick-tick-tick and tock-tock-tock. Allison, were she able to speak and were she in possession of something to barter, and were Klaus around, would have bet that she was counting down by the second, and was going to speak in under five minutes, hitting the dot on her time limit.

Carrie seemed like a smartass, and Allison had grown up with Five and Diego. One smartass 100% of the time, and one smartass when he was in control of his actions. Which... Allison didn't even know anymore.

"So, dimension travellers," Jason said, filling the silence that was only awkward on the Hargreeves side. Allison and Vanya were seated across from the two boys, who seemed to have a vast array of nicknames for each other. Little Wing, Red (both ways), Hoodie, Replacement, Big Wing, Name Stealer (also both ways), Addict, Zombie-Bird... Allison hadn't been aware that you could fit that many nicknames into a three-minute conversation, but they did it, and she had a new appreciation for their father shutting down any attempts at nicknames because she could imagine what their brothers would have come up with. "That's not new, but you guys are. What's your place like?"

"The world just ended," Vanya said dully, and Jason whistled.

"Damn. That how you end up here?"

"No," Vanya said, poking at her toast. It was covered in raspberry jam and half-melted butter. Allison had strawberry jam and unmelted butter. "Five was trying to get us back in time, I think? And we... came here instead."

"Five?"

"The kid in the uniform."

"Adopted?"

"We're all adopted."

"Same," Duke nodded, gesturing down the row of mixed-race kids. Looking closer, Allison could pick out some things; Cassandra was not pure Asian (she'd dealt with racist casting agents before, had friends who had, she could tell), Duke seemed black, but sometimes different genes overrode others, so maybe, maybe not. Jason wasn't entirely white, there was a weird tone to his skin, maybe Latin American. Tim was pale enough that he could be of mixed race but was just a vampire and never saw the sun so it didn't show. He could also just be white, and Carrie could be of mixed race as well, although it was like Duke and Tim, invisible if present.

Not that Allison could judge - or that she was. Her family... god. Ben was Asian, she was mixed, Diego was probably mixed, she couldn't remember right then and there, Luther seemed white, Klaus was white-passing, Five _was_ white, and Vanya was Aryan or whatever. Their mother was a robot and their butler-slash-better-father-than-their-actual-father was a chimp.

"So, any triggers?" Jason questioned, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. Allison frowned at him. "Hey, Umbrella Academy, superheroes. Powers and hitting the streets equals PTSD of some kind in my experience, so any triggers?"

"Diego is scared of needles," Vanya muttered, still poking at her toast. Allison took a bite of her own. It was slightly burnt on the underside. Oh well. She was hungry. "Klaus talks to the dead."

"You're currently talking to the dead." Tim's eyes were half-closed, and he had been holding his plastic orange cup of juice near his lips for the past thirty seconds without doing anything with it. Allison frowned. He tilted his head slightly towards Jason. "He's a zombie."

"They're not kidding," Carrie said, and Jason opened his mouth to tell her off, but she pointed at the clock with her spoon. "Five minutes. Ha!"

He scowled. She continued. "Yeah, he like, woke up in his coffin and punched his way out, which, by the way, you're not supposed to do. Coffins break down really fast after being put into the ground, he should have been crushed by dirt at that point, and also, to bust out, you want to pop the side out, they're weak, but he's extra and punched his way out."

Allison and Vanya exchanged glances. Vanya looked queasy. "Maybe... we shouldn't introduce you to Klaus just yet. Until we know how his powers react concerning... zombies."

"We can't exactly figure it out without trial and error," Tim mumbled, and Allison had to admit he was right. And also... Klaus. He was going to walk into Jason at some point anyways, even if they tried to separate the two.

They never got the chance to try and separate them though. Because, about two seconds after the trial and error comment, she heard Klaus, and footsteps.

"So, is there food here or what?"

"Shit," Vanya swore under her breath, which _never_ happened, and both sisters, spun in their chairs to look down the hallway they'd come from. Right there, Klaus was standing, Diego a step and a half behind and to the side of him, and Klaus was staring between his sisters, straight at Jason.

Allison opened her mouth to call out, and was hit by a wave of pain reminding her that, right, she was injured, what an idiot she was for forgetting the throbbing in her neck. The world tilted sideways, and Vanya shouted her name, hands resting on her shoulders, but all Allison could see was Diego lunging for Klaus, who had straight up fainted.

What a great start to the day.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five, Damian, Cat, Harper, Lights, Food.

_"We really should have seen this one coming."_

_"No shit, Sherlock."_

_"Language."_

_"Shut up, Jason."_

_"Make me - ow!"_

_"Whoa, are you like, half-monkey?"_

_"Carrie! That's rude!"_

_"Geez, it was just a question, no need to get prissy!"_

Five did not want to deal with the yelling. But Five doesn't usually get to do what he wanted, so he opened his eyes, and tried to sit up. Keyword; tried. He was in some kind of bed, his chest hurt a lot and his eyelids itched - sleep deprivation or exhaustion, his mind supplied - and there was an IV needle in his forearm. Along with lines, that trailed to an EKG machine. And a small child was sitting at the foot of the bed.

Brown skin. Light brown, a very nice colour - Five's had grown up with Klaus, he knew what looked nice - and he had black hair, slightly spiky, a bit like Diego. Longer. Just by a bit, not much. He had a sketchpad in his lap, a dark green pencil held in his hand, the _skritch-skritch_ of the lead on the paper barely audible over the arguments and the machines around Five.

"I suppose you'd like an explanation before your siblings come charging in here to rescue you like a herd of elephants?" the kid asked, not looking at Five, continuing to draw. He seemed young. Thirteen, at the most, although Five thought that'd be pushing it. Eleven, maybe. "I'm Damian Wayne. You're in Gotham City. Before you ask, yes. You managed to teleport yourself and five others into an alternate dimension before you passed out. Well done. If you're wondering what the shouting is about, the brother you have who sees ghosts? He just saw my brother, who came back from the dead and fainted. They're very excited about that."

Alternate dimension, Klaus fainting, both of those things made sense. The kid talking didn't, and nor did anything about Gotham City, or anything else about the situation. Five, deciding to screw explanations and figure it out himself, reached for the IV, intending to yank it out and go find answers.

A hand wrapped around his wrist. The kid's grip was firm, fingertips digging in a bit to show Five that he could do a lot worse if he wanted, and his expression was serious. "If you stand up, I believe you will collapse. Therefore, I suggest not trying that, as I have experience with older, overprotective siblings, and they are quite irritating."

"They're not older."

The kid - Damian, was his name - raised both eyebrows. "My apologies. I will rephrase. I suggest not trying that, as I have experience with overprotective siblings, and they are quite irritating."

"They're not -"

Damian didn't believe him, Five could tell, so he gave up, and prepared to jump away, only for Damian to suddenly be right beside him, pinning both his wrists to the bed at his sides, glaring down at Five. Five gave it a moment, waiting for him to speak. "Again. If you get up, you will collapse. Do I have to remind you that you jumped through dimensions? That is not something that you recover from easily."

"Whatever, short stack -"

"We're the same height."

Five sneered at the kid, who twisted his head, looking towards the curtains that ringed Five's bed, acting as weak walls. He opened his mouth, and yelled, "He's awake!"

Shit.

Footsteps. The kid didn't move, other than to go back to glaring at Five. The curtains were ripped open by a red-haired teenager, revealing a group of people behind her. "Damian, why are you on the teleporter?"

"He was attempting to get up."

"Your solution is to pin him?" Vanya asked, and Five twisted his head, looking over at his sister. Damian nodded. "Okay then."

"Get off of the kid," someone else ordered, and Damian was being dragged off of Five, by a muscled, black-haired young man with more than a few scars on his arms. Vanya appeared at his side, checking over the IV - she'd spent time with Mom, she had to know how it worked - and patted his shoulder.

"Got questions?"

"He's not very helpful," Five almost spat, jerking his chin towards Damian, who crossed his arms and let out a huff. His sketchbook and pencil were missing as if they'd just grown legs and ran off, but there were other things to worry about at the moment. "Mind explaining?"

Vanya was a great deal more helpful then Damian had been. Halfway through the explanation, a girl with a fauxhawk dyed purple-blue, who seemed to be mixed race, appeared, kicked a portion of the strangers out, tried to kick Damian out - who'd gotten his drawing stuff back and also found a grey cat that was curled around his shoulders - failed to kick Damian out, and then kicked everyone but Allison out of the area, leaving Five with Damian, Cat, Vanya, the red-haired girl who was called Carrie, and nobody else.

The fauxhawk girl was named Harper. She took no shit and saw through all of Five's shit, not believing him when he said he was fine and doing a full-checkup, or as full as she could without stripping him naked and using a CT machine. It was still very through, which was irritating.

"Yeah, dimensional travel _sucks_ ," she said, shining a different coloured light in his eyes. She'd already done what seemed to be a normal iris check and then done it with red light, and now blue light. Five had never gone through a check with different coloured lights and wasn't sure what difference it made. "I mean, I did that once, damn, that Earth was _shit_. Steph was like, Batwoman, and Lois was Superwoman, but damn, it was so weird. B was evil and Dick was a Talon, those are these immortal assassins that heal from anything like that -" Harper snapped her fingers together, switched the light to green, held Five's eye open, despite him trying to fight her, and passed it over. "- it was trippy man. I've never done drugs or like, acid or whatever, but if it's anything like those eight hours, I'm never going to. Sticking to Advil, thanks very much."

Five had no idea what Advil, Batwoman, Talon or Superwoman was. He didn't know why Harper was using Dick as a name for someone, because that nickname was dated, and he didn't know who Steph or Lois were either. He wasn't entirely sure it would be great for his health for him to find out.

Harper, thank the stars, then put the flashlight away. Five could only be glad, but she then picked up the arm that didn't have an IV in it and began to poke at him. A jolt ran through his fingers, all the way up to his arm, ending in his shoulder, making him jump. Harper whistled. "Damn, you're like, six kinds of fucked up, aren't you."

"Thanks, I hadn't noticed."

Harper poked him for a while longer, and Vanya managed to give an explanation that made more sense. Family of crazy people. Great. They jump off buildings? Awesome. One of them died? Well, so had Ben, get over it. Wait, more than one of them had died? Like, all of them had died? He could handle that, considering his life.

Damian, on occasion, snorted at something one of the girls said and interjected something into the conversation. Mostly it was things along the lines of informing the group that certain people were idiots and/or incompetent. Damian seemed like a tool.

The cat was cute though.

"And," Vanya finally managed to finish. "That's... what happened. Um... yeah. So... do you know how to get us back?"

"No idea."

Her face fell. Damian tutted, and Harper levelled a glare at him. He kept his mouth shut, and she turned back to the two siblings. She had a nose ring, Five noticed. Huh.

"Yeah, we get dimensional travel from time to time. It's not hard for us to send you guys to a different universe, cuz we have the tech and all that, the issue is which one. We want to get you guys back to the right one, otherwise, you might end up in like, the middle ages, but everybody is a zombie. No way out."

"Oh," Vanya said quietly. "Yeah, uh, let's not do that."

"Good news though," Harper stood up, off the bed, pocketing her flashlight. She dragged over a cart, and opened one of the drawers, taking out a new IV bag, and attaching it to Five's drip, which was not needed. Harper took down the old one and threw it at Damian. "Throw that out, brat."

Damian said something that Five didn't understand but sounded rude. He did, however, stand up and head out. Harper went back to what she'd been saying. "We can locate your universe. We're going to have to do some tests to do that, might take a few days, but it'll work out."

"How, many days?"

"Three at the least. That's so that you guys don't go back in rough shape, might as well drop you off all shiny. Eight at the most depends on how different your world is. From what we can tell, the answer is very, so we're looking at around six or seven days, give or take.

"Think you can handle that?"

Vanya nodded and patted Five's shoulder. "I'll... go get you some food. If, that's okay?"

Harper nodded. "You haven't been in a coma, so solids should be fine. If you throw up, we'll be revising that though - DT sometimes mucks up your insides."

That... sounded great. The food, not the insides bit, that was worrying. Five managed to give Vanya a smile that hopefully wasn't mean, and whispered out a quiet thank you. Harper had taken off the EKG leads, leaving just the IV in. She gave him a short lecture on not taking it out otherwise she'd kick his ass and they'd be stuck in her world for a month, and then left to do whatever.

* * *

Luther was putting this group together. Slowly. The blonde who'd come in with a shout of _good morning America!!!_ had a stomach bigger than anyone he'd met, and could talk faster than anyone he knew with her mouth full. The two identical boys seemed to both hate each other and depend on each other like nothing he'd seen before, and they were all related.

And also, all heroes. And insane. The Asian girl had stabbed her - plastic, mind you - fork half an inch into the table when her brother had tried to grab the last pancake from the middle of the table, and they all treated it like it was normal. For Luther, nobody had done that since Klaus had been seventeen and extremely high at the time. He'd also been sobbing about Five and quoting Romeo and Juliet for some reason.

It felt familiar enough that he was comfortable. Although he did want to know how the girl got the - plastic! - fork that deep into the - wooden - table in a single move, without looking like it took any effort. Because, unlike his family, not a single one of them had powers, other than the black kid, Duke. He saw into the future a little bit, as evidenced by how he, out of the blue, said _Stephanie's going to trip,_ when she'd been coming back to the table with waffles, and then, not a moment later, she had. She hadn't dropped anything though, somehow flipping around and landing in a crouch. Nobody treated that like it was weird either, so Luther didn't himself.

Klaus was half out of it, staring at Jason, who'd apparently died? After finding out the reason for that, Stephanie had huffed and mentioned that she'd _also_ died, which had resulted in an argument abut faked deaths. Luther... didn't want to know. In any case, Diego was poking bits of food at their brothers mouth and Klaus would absently open his mouth and let Diego put egg or bacon or toast in, then just chew mechanically. Seeing a zombie was bound to do that, he supposed, considering how Klaus had gotten away from the regular ghosts through drugs and other substances.

He was worried about Five. Since... Five was a bit of an idiot. But Allison had dragged him out of the medical space, and for someone not talking or communicating easily, she could boss him around really well.

Evidenced by her glare, and her pointing at his plate.

He obidently ate a bit more toast.


	4. Chapter 4

Ben is very interested in these people. And it's not just because there's nothing else to do, he's been a ghost for a while now, he's entertained himself for a while now, so he's not bored, but these kids are interesting. Very, interesting.

They're fighting. It's the kind of fighting that is physical, is a spar, but Ben isn't sure if it's training or if the two fighters - Stephanie and Harper - were trying to hurt each other. Klaus was still staring at Jason like he's invented crack or some such shit, which, yeah, that's a trip in itself, Ben's half tempted to ask how Jason died and came back in such a way for him to have a ghost aura that Klaus can see - Ben can't, but that's probably because Jason's technically alive at the moment.

Stephanie grabs Harper around the shoulders, swings her legs under the taller, sturdier-built girl's arm, and up, flipping around so she's clinging to Harper's back like some kind of demented monkey. She hangs there, hooking her ankles together at Harper's stomach and holding on tight, trying to choke the purple-blue haired girl out.

It's familiar. Except, about ten times more violent. And more impressive. Harper kicked her legs out from under her, landing on her back and squashing Stephanie under her. Stephanie didn't waver, grunting and wiggling to get higher up on Harper's back, still choking her out. Harper flailed, kicking her legs into the air and twisting around until she was facing Stephanie, and throwing elbows. Stephanie covered up, pulling her feet up to her chest, and Ben looked over to Vanya, who was sitting on the floor beside Damian, distracted by the battle. The kid was drawing.

The kid reminded him of Five. If Five wasn't so... Five-like.

Ben had been spending too much time with Klaus. It wasn't good for him - not that he had a choice, and Klaus needed someone following him around 24/7/360 anyways, the amount of bullshit he got himself in. Even if most of what Ben did was tell him he was being stupid, which Klaus already knew, even if he didn't admit it.

Why couldn't Vanya have been the one with ghost powers? She was so much easier to deal with.

Stephanie kicked Harper across the training mats, and the taller girl rolled up, over her shoulder, and onto her feet, into a low crouch, her feet spread for better balance. Stephanie threw herself at her sister, and they began to wrestle.

"Reminds me of home," Vanya said quietly, and Damian scoffed. "What?"

"Nothing," he said dryly, pencil dancing across the page. Ben took a peek at the artwork. It was the two girls, but... they looked different. Stephanie was in a bodysuit, a cloak around her shoulders, a pair of sticks in her hands. She was in motion, seemingly flipping backwards, a hood over her hair and a mask over her lower face, and while the sketch was still rough, Ben could tell that she was smirking. Damian was a good artist.

On the other side of the page, was Harper. She had some kind of gun in her hand, but it looked strange. Damian was focusing on that, erasing and redrawing, adding fine details to make it look right. She had a sort of cowl, her hair free, and a bird in flight spread across her chest. 

"Okay!" Someone shouted, clapping their hands together, and Ben whirled around, looking for the source. Barbara, with her headset one, and a cup of coffee in the cup holder on the side of her armrest, was the source. "Gather 'round, siblings mine, and guests ours!"

"You realize that that makes it sound like you're married to your brother, right?" Carrie asked, grabbing Harper by the back of her shirt and dragging her off Stephanie, who was still kicking and making muffled grunting noises. Tim grabbed the blonde and hauled her over. Barbara made a face at her cousin.

"Siblings-in-law, happy?"

"No, just amused."

"Pretty sure that means you're happy," Jason muttered, crossing his arms and giving Tim a look that the younger kid didn't notice or return. Ben stepped away from Allison, who'd almost walked through him, and then side-stepped Five, who was being followed around by Diego, who was in full older-brother-mode. Which wasn't something the guy got to use a lot, so Ben figured there was no harm in letting him to it, although Five looked dangerously close to stabbing Two, so that was probably something to keep an eye on.

And Ben would have if Klaus was responsive, but Klaus had shifted from staring at Jason to staring at Damian, which made sense, as apparently he'd died as well as Cass, and Stephanie, and someone called Dick who was yet to show up and a little evil part of Ben, or maybe the sane part of him, hoped he wouldn't, because if he did and was gay or hot or both, and Klaus realized that, they were all dead.

So he didn't bother keeping an eye on the potential stabbing attempt, as he couldn't do much to it.

"So, what I've gathered, is that you guys," Barbara gestured to the numbers, "Have a ghost for a sibling. Klaus, is he around?"

No answer. Diego poked Klaus with a finger, then reached for a knife and poked him with the tip of that, just to the side of Klaus' eye. The Waynes - as was their adoptive father's name - didn't find that weird. That was nice. Normally, people went nuts when stuff like that happened. Not this family, which was also concerning.

Many things, these days, were concerning.

Klaus, after the knife, blinked a few times. "Huh? What day is it?"

"Where's Ben?"

Ben gave a wave. Klaus looked at him, then pointed at him. "Beside Five. On his left."

Five looked up, meeting Ben's eyes, and he grinned at him, even though he couldn't see him. He liked Five. Even though he was... Five.

"Great. I hate addressing a room when I want to talk to one person," Barbara said, looking right at him. Just a bit off, slightly too far to the left, but close. "Ben, please don't move, so that I know where you are. Anyways," she tapped the armrest of her chair that didn't have a cup holder, and a holographic screen - awesome - appeared before her. She spun it around and began to tap at it until it showed a checklist. "So, welcome to our Earth. We call it Earth 1A, as it's our Earth. You guys are not an A Earth, as A Earths have people we have here. After some chatting, we've figured out that we're not at all similar, as proven by the Black Widow conversation we had a few minutes ago. We don't have Black Widow comic books.

"So, we're going to do some tests. They're blood tests, to see if they're similar to ours, and they're going to be some medical ones, for Allison, to see if we can speed your throat along. If the damage is busted, we'll get you working on hand signs so we can communicate, as writing takes a while. Lucky for you, Cass here is an ASL expert."

Cass waved and made a few gestures that Ben, who'd learned ASL at one point - it had been his chosen language at the time, the other's had thought he was an idiot for picking it - translated. "I can't wait to teach you, I hope I can measure up."

Allison nodded, in a very 'uh, thanks' sort of way. Barbara looked at Ben again. "For Ben, we're curious about how that works, so if it's okay with you Ben and Klaus, then we're going to see if we can do some tests regarding that as well. It's up to you two, but it might yield some results about why Klaus can only see you despite being an addict."

"Yeah, that's fine," Ben said, nodding, and Diego poked Klaus in the head again with the knife.

"What'd he say?"

"Uh... cool?"

Close enough. At least his family believed that Ben was there now, or was humouring Klaus. Ben didn't care, so long as they acted like he was there, because that was more than enough for him at the moment. Hugs would be nice too, but treating him - or the air, dependant on their beliefs - like he was there, would be great.

"For the rest of you, patrol!" Barbara clapped her hands together. "Other then Harper, I need you here to perform the tests, and if I could get Cullen to stick around for comms, that would be great, no, you don't get to argue, you got thrown through a brick wall two days ago, you're staying put."

The kid with an identical haircut to Harper's crossed his arms, scowled, and sighed. Harper just shrugged. She seemed to like needles and pissing people off, and medical tests did piss Five off. So, that was a match made in heaven, he supposed. (Was Heaven a real thing? Considering, well, he was a ghost. Maybe Klaus was just crazy and didn't have powers and Ben didn't exist. Okay, not thinking about that anymore, that was scary.)

"And for the Hargreeves, you're stuck in here. As... alien invasions, time travel, so on and so on. You're free to wander about once we finish the tests though, and listen in on patrol. Capiche?"

Nods and murmurs of agreement. The Waynes, save for Cullen, Harper, and Barbara, wandered off to do whatever, and those three herded Ben's family back to the medical area. Harper, who seemed delighted by the prospect of ordering people around, began to do an exam for Vanya, drawing blood, taking blood pressure, checking her eyes with the weird lights she'd used on Five, and poking at her in general.

"Pre-patrol checks everyone, then clear out!" Barbara clapped her hands together, and that was that. Boom.

* * *

"This," Harper explained, as she smeared what felt like and probably was Vaseline across Allison's neck, "Is so that we can do an ultrasound."

Klaus put his hand up. He was in an armchair that had somehow appeared in the medical area, or maybe it'd been there the whole time and Allison hadn't noticed. His arm wavered in the way that she usually associated with him being high but had come to realize that it was Klaus being Klaus and him failing to be an adult. "Don't you do that when she's pregnant?"

Harper scoffed. "I mean, yeah, duh. But in case you didn't notice," she moved to stand at Allison's side, fingers cold as she covered Allison's neck with the stuff. Her hair had been pinned up, out of the way, but it felt weird. Diego and Five had already gone through their exams and were sitting by Barbara, watching the screens like she was. Five looked bored, but he usually did, and Diego looked interested, which usually meant violence or someone embarrassing themselves. Hopefully the latter, but considering the Wayne's, probably the former.

"Allison isn't pregnant," Harper continued. "And I'm doing it to her neck. This is less-invasive then an x-ray, which would mean radiation, and we don't yet know how you guys would react with our radiation levels and the kind of radiation. It could be fine, it could do nothing, and you guys could mutate into giant six-legged insect zombies with slugs for eyes and no insides."

A beat.

"No, that did happen once, I wish it hadn't."

Oh. Great.

"Besides, Carrie's all about using 'kinder' methods these days. She's got scoliosis and they're seeing if they can determine her curve through an ultrasound, it's this entire project, and I guess the rest of us just caught on. And considering how many x-rays we get, it's probably a good idea to find alternate methods."

Oh. Oh.

"Anyways, an ultrasound probably won't make you into giant zombie insects, but we're taking the risk all the same."

Allison swallowed as Harper picked up some kind of wand, grinning like an insane person, or just like Klaus after the first time he'd tried heroine - not a good memory. "Let's give it a shot! Hey, if you do become a zombie, it's cool if we murder you, right?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I have any idea what I'm doing? No, not at all! Am I having fun? Yeah, totally, this is a trip! I've never done drugs, nor do I want to, but if they're anything like writing this, I can see the appeal. But still. Ew. Drugs.
> 
> Does anyone else hate Allison's new hairstyle? I detest it. I like Vanya's new look, I didn't really like the white suit, it looked really... fake, I guess. Not really solid. And the crazy lady who Diego escaped with, whatever her name is, I like her. Oh my god, I like her. And also, worst father of the year award goes to Hargreeves, Bruce, you're exempt.
> 
> I had a long morning, I don't think I took my normal meds, or maybe I did but it's just one of those days. Yeah... probably the second. Expect a gap in updates, once a day isn't sustainable, sorry! And by a gap, I mean a week or so, because I've got some sports lined up, and also the library and some things that my parents want me to participate in. The week after, I gotta work at their camp, so that'll effect updates as well.
> 
> Also, I keep on switching tenses? Sorry about that, when I write on paper I tend to write in the present tense - I've been filling a notebook with Tumblr stories so that I can copy them over, as I can't lug a laptop around town - but I type in the past, most of the time. I'm trying to keep them organized, at least so that in one chapter the tense doesn't change, but I'm not sure how good I'm doing at that right now.
> 
> And... I posted stuff that should have been drafts and can't be bothered to change that. Oh well, if you follow the series this is on, you get a hat trick of stories thrown in today, but there probably won't be any for the next few days. And also... anti-maskers are a thing now. That's... I feel like going back to school might be more trouble then it's worth.


	5. Interlude: Harper Row, AKA Bluebird

These people were strange. Harper couldn't help but watch them in the reflection of her laptop's screen, as she typed away, sorting through her collected data. Nobody had turned into giant zombies, thank whatever powerful beings watched over and probably had heart attacks due to the Clan, but the way the group was staring at the security footage of Harper's siblings, they might very well be zombies.

Not to mention, the banter.

 _"Hey, so, here's a question,"_ Red Hood started, and Harper glanced up at the array of screens, finding the one that showed Jason and Tim in a run-down theatre, taking out Two-Face minions. _"How'd it get exactly half his face? And what about his dick?"_

 _"The fact that 'Wing's name is what it is makes that question even worse,"_ Spoiler told him, from across town, where she was rooftop running, mostly just killing time until something came out. Patrolling. She executed a cat pass between buildings, and rolled over her shoulder on landing, skidding across the rooftop in a crouch. _"And also, comic logic."_

 _"She's been on the TV Tropes page lately,"_ Batgirl happily informed everyone, before she jumped off Wayne Tower with a whoop, tucking into a ball and flipping a few times before she released her line and swung up, like Spider-Man, twisting through the air. _"The Rule of Cool, maybe?"_

 _"The Rule of what now?"_ Red Robin asked, leaning out of the way of a punch, grabbing the guys arm, and striking him in the throat. The guy dropped, and Red Robin spun, kicking another in the kneecaps, drawing his bo, and striking the man across the temple with one end, and tripping him with the other, knocking him out with a kick. _"What the hell is that?"_

"I thought you were all nerdy or something?" Cullen called, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms, smirking, even though nobody in the field could see him. Vanya blinked at him, glancing between Cullen and Diego a few times, frowning, then doing it again. "Shouldn't you know about this stuff?"

_"I don't read comic books! And I'm pretty sure I'm a geek, not a nerd!"_

"Your loss."

 _"Back to the point, what brought this up?"_ Nightwing questioned, over in Blüdhaven. _"And also, did you have to phrase it like that?"_

 _"I thought you liked dick jokes?"_ Spoiler jumped off her rooftop, landing on a lamppost. She jumped from the first lampost to another, swinging off of it and flipping through the air, landing on a bus, where she sat down cross-legged, and pulled out her cell phone. _"But yeah, seriously, the name makes that so bad. I didn't understand that phase in school until we did Sex Ed, then I thought it was stupid. Like, that's a name, people."_

"You know, like, all our last names are first names?" Harper said, giving up on the data and focusing on her siblings instead. Stephanie was laying on her back on the bus. Nightwing was rooftop diving. Cassandra and Duke were creeping around the docks, hence their silence. 

_"Really?"_

"Yeah. Thomas, Todd -"

_"That's a first name?"_

_"Suck it, Blondie."_

_"Shut up, Jay."_

"Yeah. Drake -"

_"That's a bird, not a name."_

_"It's both. And a dragon."_

_"You're the worst dragon ever."_

_"Thank you, for your input."_

"Kelley, Row, Cain has been used as a first name, Wayne, Gordon. That's everyone but Dick and Stephanie. But Grey is a first name if you ignore the son bit, and Brown... yeah, let's not go there anytime, especially not tonight."

 _"Agreed."_ Spoiler chimed, jumping from the bus to a new lamppost. She swung around it a few times, and let go, flipping up and firing off her grapple, swinging away. _"Slow night over here."_

 _"Anyone else think something'll go boom then?"_ Hawkfire asked, and Harper noticed that more than one of the travellers tensed at that. Probably more at the casual allusion to an explosion than the new person. Harper leaned over, and entered a keyword into the main keyboard, the one Barbara wasn't using, pulling up Bette's tracker on one screen, and activating the following program, which figured out which cameras could see the trackers location and followed them. It was a pretty sweet program if Harper did say so herself. She leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms and watching Batgirl walk along the edge of a building, arms out to her sides, placing one foot before the other, heel to toe, heel to toe, like she was on a tightrope. Batgirl reached the corner of the roof, and bent her knees, springing up and executing a half-twist layout, landing on the fire escape across the alleyway, the green bat on her chest fading away into the shadows.

 _"Assult in progress,"_ Batgirl reported, voice little more than a murmur, and Harper didn't change her positioning. Neither did Barbara, but the travellers did, tensing, and one or two of them leaning forwards. _"O."_

"Calling officers now," Barbara relayed, fingers drumming out a pattern on her keyboard. She ended the motion with a small flourish and looked up to the screens, eyes on her cousin. "Got it covered?"

 _"No doubts,"_ Batgirl whispered, and Harper grinned, looking over her shoulder at the travellers.

"Keep an eye on her."

Batgirl spoke again, louder, clearly addressing the group below, and Harper pulled the main keyboard over to herself, minimizing the other screens, so that Carrie was the focus, and pulling up a second angle, so that they could see the group she'd spotted below her perch. _"You know, there's something called a dictionary?"_

 _"What?"_ one of the guys shouted, and Batgirl huffed, dramatically. The two of the three men below looked around wildly, while the third froze in place, unmoving. _"Show yourself!"_

 _"And there's this word in the dictionary,"_ Batgirl continued, unperturbed by the shouting. "It's no. Pretty sure he said no, either get the hell out of here or wake up in a hospital."

_"Bitch!"_

Batgirl dove off of the fire escape, and landed on the first man's shoulders with her hands, holding herself in a handstand for barely a moment, before her legs fell down and she pushed off, slamming into the second man's chest with both combat boots, slamming him into the ground, and landing on him, in a very dramatic crouch. Out of all of them, Carrie was second in dramatics, which did probably come from being a theatre kid. And she used it well, rolling away from the man she'd knocked out, and coming up in a crouch, sweeping the leg.

The angle wasn't great, and the man had been moving back anyways, so she mostly just tripped him up. His arms windmilled, and he regained his balance, just in time for Batgirl to grab his face in both hands an show it to her knee, which was painful for the older person in that equation. Being a stubborn assault offender, the man stepped back, lifted his fist, and went to punch her. Batgirl, being a good vigilante, blocked his haymaker at the wrist, and wrapped her fingers around his wrist, finishing it up with a quip. _"Advice? Jab, don't swing. It's faster."_

She ducked under his arm, holding onto his wrist, and put him in an armbar from behind, twisting his hand, and earning a scream. She kicked his knee out from behind, and he dropped to one knee. Batgirl let go and took a single step back. The man gasped, doubling over and panting. _"T-Thank you -"_

He rose up straight again, still on one knee, and Batgirl whipped around, ankle hooking around his left ear and slamming his head down into the ground. _"You're welcome."_

"There were easier ways to do that," Barbara remarked. Batgirl hummed in answer, stepping over the two bodies and towards the victim. She grasped his hand, a lot gentler than she had with the offender, and pressed a card into his hands, the writing on it glowing faintly in the dark.

 _"Officers are on their way. You can press charges if you want. And maybe disown them,"_ she added as an afterthought, turning to look at the two men. _"Presuming you know them from somewhere else?"_

_"Y-yeah."_

_"Disown them,"_ Batgirl decided. _"And sue them. That's always entertaining. Chin up!"_

She used two fingers to do just that and sprinted towards the back of the alley. She jumped, kicking off one wall, and vaulting over the fence there, grabbing the fire escape on the other side and flipping herself up, jumping off and swinging away.

"The shorter kids are better at the assaults," Harper informed the travellers, who had an array of emotions playing on their faces. It was pretty fun to watch. "Since they don't typically bear similarities to the offenders. Batgirl's a bit -"

_"You can say I'm crazy, it's true."_

"I'm sure you can guess."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Handles and Who Has Them:
> 
>  **Batgirl IV:** Carrie Kelley  
>  **Nightwing:** Dick Grayson  
>  **Red Hood:** Jason Todd  
>  **Red Robin:** Tim Drake  
>  **Bluebird:** Harper Row  
>  **Hawkfire:** Bette Kane  
>  **Batwoman:** Kate Kane  
>  **Bluejay:** Cullen Row  
>  **Orphan:** Cass Cain  
>  **Signal:** Duke Thomas


End file.
